Using up my fabric stash, one scrap at a time!

Project Five: A Teddy Bear’s Bed

The boy has a bear, and his name is Red. In his mind, the relationship with Red is much like Calvin’s relationship with Hobbes. For a while now he has wanted a bed for Red, so this weekend I was feeling charitable and decided it would be a good project for us to do together. It was also a good chance to use some of the wood scraps we have been hoarding.

First I sent him off to draw up a plan, which you can see in the photo above. Upon completing his plan, his only comment was “I’m really cross that Red turned out looking like a pig”.

No matter. It was a workable plan. We rummaged through our scraps of wood and came up with enough pieces to work with. We set to work with the saw, and got all the pieces cut to size.

Mr. B helping out

Next we set to work building the frame. On the plan it said “use dowels to attach everything”, so we got out the drill, charged it up (we really need a more powerful drill), and set to work with the dowels and wood glue.

Once the frame was built we attached the legs, and left the whole thing clamped to the workbench to set. While the wood glue was drying we set about making the base. We decided to make a padded base to act as the mattress too. It was less complicated this way. (And meant I got to use my new staple gun).

We used a piece of thin MDF as our base, and first covered it in some batting, stapling it to the underside. Once the batting was all secure we added a layer of lovely soft white fleece and also stapled this to the underside. Because I knew that the batting and fleece would add bulkiness to the sides of the MDF, I cut it slightly smaller than we needed it. Once it was all covered it fit perfectly into the bed frame.

All that was left to do was prime and paint the whole frame and make find some bedding.

To prop the bed up while we painted it, I used nails hammered into the bottom of the bedposts, as suggested by Chez Larsson. It worked brilliantly, and meant we could paint the whole thing without moving it and it didn’t stick to the newspaper. Brilliant tip.

Ta Da! The finished bed. The boy is happy.

Not bad really, for a project that cost us nothing but our time and used materials we already had. I recommend this project for anyone who has scraps of wood that need using up and has or knows children who would appreciate it.